Moving from Storage to Sanctuary

It’s amazing to me, how one space, with a little bit of work, can serve two entirely different purposes. Take, for instance, our current storage space. Right now, a cumulative fifty years’ worth of junk is sorted (more or less) on floor-to-ceiling, wall-to-wall shelving, tucked in a tall-boy dresser, and stacked in a double-wide closet full of boxes.

This room, currently an impressive array of storage, is soon to be a bedroom for our firstborn. Before we start the superficial transformation, there’s a little matter of moving a wall, so the room has only one doorway, to the rest of the house (we’re moving the door to the garage to the hallway, outside the room). After that, we can get to work on the decorating, which will make the big change.

Thankfully, my husband is quite talented, especially when it comes to things like home remodeling. Where I have to see it with my eyes to understand what’s being discussed and planned, he can visualize the whole thing in his head. It’s probably just as well that my vivid imagination doesn’t extend to remodeling. If it did, I’d surely get such grandiose plans that I’d be continually disappointed, since I’d never be able to keep up with the plans. He, on the other hand, seems to often end up with what surpasses his planning, at least, from my perspective.

With this project, we’ll have to move some wires, as well as the framing and drywall. We’ve already confirmed that the wall is not a supporting wall, which makes the whole thing much easier than it would be otherwise. The current carpeting, too, is no issue, since it’s pretty nasty, and we’ve been replacing it elsewhere, already. In fact, in the area that will be the hallway, we already have the new flooring, so as soon as all the demolition is done, we can get that laid (FLOR tiles—antimicrobial, mobile, easily cleanable, shiftable, can’t beat ‘em!).

The only delay is the minor detail of time to do the work—we don’t have any. This project isn’t yet a high priority, since the baby is still sleeping closer to our room and will be, through the hot weather of the summer. We have some time until there’s a real time crunch, which is good, since we still have to deal with the water coming into the next room over…. It would be great if we could afford to hire a contractor to do the work, although we probably would have a hard time letting someone else work on our house, especially doing work we can do ourselves.

For the newly-adjusted bedroom, we have still to choose and get the flooring, but the color scheme is pretty well set, and the artwork is framed and ready to hang (Daddy to the rescue!). What is now a stark white, packed-out storage room is soon to be a bright, colorful, cozy little nook for our baby, with many memories to be made. It’s all just a hammer, a drill, and a paintbrush away (and a bit of time, I’m afraid!).